Message Formats

The protocol layer defines message formats for Bitcoin P2P protocol communication.

Protocol Variants

Each protocol variant (mainnet, testnet, regtest) has specific message formats and network parameters:

  • Magic Bytes: Unique identifier for each network variant
  • Message Headers: Standard Bitcoin message header format
  • Message Types: version, verack, inv, getdata, tx, block, etc.

Network Parameters

Protocol-specific parameters include:

  • Default ports (mainnet: 8333, testnet: 18333, regtest: 18444)
  • Genesis block hashes
  • Difficulty adjustment intervals
  • Block size limits
  • Feature activation heights

For detailed protocol specifications, see the blvm-protocol README.

See Also